BOB (Best of the Blogs) Debuts!

Introducing BOB!

Editor’s Note: I have the privilege of working with some of the most talented, insightful, and committed Catholic writers anywhere. From the famous, like Patrick Madrid and Sheila Liaugminas, whose radio shows reach millions, to young talents like Dwija Borobia, Cari Donaldson, Mary Lane, and Jane Sloan that the world is just discovering. There are young writers here, like Stephen Beale, who is already a seasoned professional, having worked for the New Hampshire’s Union Leader and other major publications; and leaders of important ministries, like Dan Spencer, the Executive Director of the National Fellowship of Catholic Men. There are writers like Daria Sockey, who established her reputation independently and is now being sought after all over the Catholic map, and ones like Marisa Pereira who proved with one or two articles that her message was one the CE community wanted to hear. There are philosophers and artists writing on high culture like Daniel McInerny and David Clayton, and the B-Movie Catechism’s mysterious “David” who has one of the finest takes I’ve ever encountered on how popular movies capture the zeitgeist.

We are bombarded with too much information these days, and the truly amazing work our bloggers have been doing might have zipped past in the carousel before you had a chance to take a look. BOB! (Best of the Blogs), which we hope to make a recurring feature on the weekends, will give you a chance to sample the bloggers’ work. We think that soon when you visit Catholic Exchange, you’ll be saying to yourself, “I wonder what my favorite blogger has been thinking about.” That’s why I come back to many publications again and again, because they feature writers who speak to me. Please share this with your friends. Thanks to these talented people we are starting to rock it at Catholic Exchange!

from Dwija Borobia, “House Unseen”

When my kids get along and treat each other with kindness and refrain from doing the things they know will irritate each other and bite their tongues when they want to say something that will make them sound smart but is not kind, the world is a better place.

Yet there they are, fighting.

…”You’re choosing to be miserable. It’s crazy…”

And there it is. My own words are like a not-so-delectable slice of humble pie, waiting patiently to be eaten…. God shakes His Head. He sighs. And He wonders why I’m choosing to be miserable. Read more…

from Daniel McInerny, “Crafting Culture”

A friend of mine wrote on Facebook about Downton Abbey: “take away the English accents, the bucolic setting, the period costumes, and the antiquated moral cde, and you’re left with Days of Our Lives.

So true, I thought at first. Downton Abbey often suffers from severe melodramatic fits.

Such as: the illicit lover who ends up dying in flagrante delicto…the spine-injured war-hero who suddenly and miraculously walks again…the lovers kept apart by social class…the dying fiancée who importunes her betrothed to marry the woman she knows he really loves…the odious newspaper magnate who coerces a young woman into marriage on pains of exposing her awful secret…

Pretty fruity stuff, as Bertie Wooster would say. But how different, really, from plot elements that might be found in Dickens, Wilkie Collins, Trollope, or The Great Gatsby? Read more…

from David, at “B-Movie Catechism”

[On James Coburn’s role in the film, “Looker”] You see, along with inventing the L.O.O.K.E.R. (Light Ocular-Oriented Kinetic Emotive Responses) hypnotizing gun and a method of brainwashing television viewers utilizing light pulses, James Coburn and the eeevil scientists at the Digital Matrix laboratory also calculated the exact physical measurements a person needs in order to be appealing to the broadest audience. That’s why Finney’s plastic surgeon character has a string of models coming into his office seeking reconstructive surgery for reasons such as their cheekbones are 0.4 millimeters too high or their areola is 5 millimeters too wide. But it doesn’t stop there. Even after all of the models receive the required surgical corrections, Digital Matrix determines that the illusion of perfection is broken once the women start moving around. In order to maintain the desired results, it’s decided that the bodies of the actresses need to be optically scanned into the computers and animated, as digital duplicates, unlike their human counterparts, can be programmed to maintain optimal positioning. Hence the scene in which Susan Dey, much to the delight of Partridge Family slash fiction aficionados everywhere (c’mon, it’s the Internet, you know they’re out there somewhere), doffs her clothing and steps into the world’s biggest scanner. Unfortunately, once all the models are properly pixelated, Digital Matrix decides it no longer needs the live women and begins killing them off to prevent competitors from acquiring their services. Read more…

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